http://www.arktimes.com/ArkansasBlog/archives/2013/02/04/monday-night-the-millionaire-line Comments On: Monday night: The millionaire line by Max Brantley en-us Copyright 2013 Arkansas Times. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, Arkansas Times readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact Arkansas Times. robert@arktimes.com (Arkansas Times Webmaster) Sun, 26 May 2013 00:00:01 -0500 Sun, 26 May 2013 02:45:00 -0500 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss
There are some very capable within the state party -- we just need to see a flushing of some of the old guard more worried about self-preservation and more of these folks assuming the top leadership positions. Personally, I can't wait until Mike Beebe's reign of personal glorification is over so we can hit the reset button on this thing.
Posted by jbwoodmansee]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 17:21:34 -0600 Arkansas Times
It's Norma's point, I think, though I feel kinda honored to be put in the same sentence with her/you. But then again, I've always had issues about figuring out where it is I fit.
Posted by Vanessa]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 16:46:23 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 13:39:23 -0600 Arkansas Times
Nowhere in the quite-long article was any reference made to the financial largesse said bro's lavished on the Republican candidates who now are in the position of deciding whether to approve the $200 million giveaway?
Posted by GrizLee Bear]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 12:30:31 -0600 Arkansas Times
I'm pretty sure I always say that.
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 12:29:22 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 11:56:10 -0600 Arkansas Times
"A lot of people didn't know . . . " -- same thing Catholic Germany said after the Holocaust.

"Not very many people recognized the problem . . . "

Bullshit. If you MUST post just to hear yourselves, address the facts Signorile succinctly outlines, instead of drumming up false equivalencies and arguing those. You sound like trolls. Maybe you are, on this.

"Three years into the epidemic, Koch's administration had shockingly only spent $24,500 on AIDS while, that same year, 'San Francisco, a city one-tenth the size of New York, spent $4.3 million, a figure that grew to over $10 million annually by 1987.'"

That's just ONE devastating fact Signorile cites.

"SAME YEAR," different cities, different politicians. TOTALLY different responses. Koch's New York response being next to nothing by comparison. Everybody knows it. Why can't you accept it? Why keep making excuses for it?

You people are falsifying the memory of a man who did nothing about AIDS, at a time when plenty of others were doing all they could. You're like Huckabee's revisionist historian pal, David Barton. WHY you're making excuses on this blog is your own problem.

Don't you READ articles that are cited here? Koch treated people horribly--not just those in NY dying of AIDS, but people he supposedly loved (THREATENING them if they told).

Ed Koch was "a monster, harming and abusing those around him while turning his back on suffering and mass death." That's the truth about Ed Koch.

The man was a terrified liar and bully all his life. He didn't give a hoot for OTHER human lives or suffering because, at the time, AIDS was identified with gays and all he cared about was saving his own skin. His jolly-tough man-of-the-streets act was phony from day one till the day he died.

So he also gave NY the figurative Volkswagen. Fine.

Koch's record and lack of humanity on AIDS is hideous and completely self-serving. SO hideous and self-serving, apparently, the rest of you keep squirming to scurry from the truth and yell, "Looky over here!"

Give me a fucking break.
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 09:15:15 -0600 Arkansas Times
George Washington just sat around and did nothing about the British Empire's oppression in India!

I grow tired of people being blamed for causes they did not die for.

We are free to pick our fights and avoid others that would overwelm us and divert resources from at least one area we may improve.

Who picks what fight is a very personal decision.

My motto I teach and preach is "make each place better when you leave than when you arrived!"

Much can be accomplished that way.

For my charity work (for lack of a better term) I avoided feeling used or abused by chosing only innocent causes.

I don't give money to pan handlers but i give time to children's causes. 10 years as a volunteer "BiG" in Big Brothers Big Sisters and member of Big League (fund raising arm underwriting outtings and holiday parties). I adopoted a shelter dog.

I did not relieve the hunger or suffering of homeless grownups. I feared suspecting them of maybe lying to me of their need or having caused their own situation might justify quitting when the going got tough.

I did what I could to possibly reduce the number of homeless a decade into the futre.

A brother-in-law did and does nothing for fatherless boys with Big Brothers but he voluteers at Children's Hospital holding, hugging, cuddling and rocking critically ill infants.

If I outlive my BinL, at his funeral I will laud his work at Children's not deride his lack of work for the fatherless.

A politician, Ed or any other, only has so many causes they can make a difference in before they are diliuted and dissipated beyond effect in any.

I was pretty disappointed in the abuse Obama was taking by groups that had not had centuries or decades of oppression relieved by his first 2 years in office.

The backers of eliminating DADT were nowhere to be found when Obama was being bloodied in Singlepayer healthcare.

Those wishing to close Gitmo were and still are quiet while Obama is fighting with the Republicans to end the disasterous W tax cuts.

The ability to extract the US from another disasterous W escapade, the Weapons of Mass Destruction Iraq Invasion came about by not YET entering the quagmire of Same Sex Marriage.

Maybe I read Norma's posts incorrectly but I read that Ed's crime was in not helping enough or at all as opposed to resticting the gay issues.

If I mow a vacant overgrown lot near me am I to be thanked or cursed that I neglected a worse lot in a more deserving part of town?
Posted by Citizen1]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 07:17:36 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by Verla Sweere]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 04:14:29 -0600 Arkansas Times
The old, "I don't want to fight Norma, but--" routine (missing that essential first comma, you old journalist, you; so Freudian).

Of course you want to fight Norma. Because you immediately launch a series of halfhearted distractions to ignore the point--Koch's record on AIDS.

"I'm not whitewashing his actions, Norma. Just looking for a reason for them. Maybe he was scared; maybe he did not recognize the dangers."

Maybe pigs flew.

Maybe you're not whitewashing. Maybe just determined to misdirect and change the subject to continue the "fight" you say you don't want, which nobody started but you (in the distance, some tired bus-and-truck company's Don Quixote sings "The Impossible Dream" in yet ANOTHER revival).

"We need to judge a politician on his total record. . . . I was not a big Ed Koch fan when I saw him on television, because I thought he was a self-promoting egotist, but that doesn't keep him from being a great politician."

Of course, nobody said he wasn't. But then you wouldn't have your argument--pardon me--"fight"--you pretend not to want.

So "great politician" is your final attempt to change the subject so you can keep "fighting" the windmill of your mind.

Except not final, because you slink back with one MORE post, for some reason.

Speaking of "mind," never mind that "great politician" applies to every egomaniac who ever disdained human lives for personal expediency. "Great politician."

Maybe that wasn't your intention and maybe the moon's made of green cheese, but you lost me at, "I don't want to fight, but--."

I'm thinking you'd better go back in that phone booth and change out of those tights.

They seem to be cutting off circulation to your brain centers connected with reason, logic and commas.
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Tue, 05 Feb 2013 04:11:49 -0600 Arkansas Times
They basically account for everything! From choice of locale, to loves, education, religion (or lack of it), careers, financial status, even health (outside of genetic physical disabilities).

Of course, few want to take responsibility for their own NEGATIVE belief systems and the inevitable results in their lives, so powerful are beliefs AS FACTS. (They’re not facts: they’re BELIEFS about facts. And beliefs CAN be changed, as can the results in their lives.)

Beliefs aren’t just individual; they’re also collective, which reinforces their power.

The South (generally speaking, of course) and its “reputation” are perfect examples.

For so long, inherited beliefs about Southern guilt (over slavery), provincialism, ignorance, outsiders, higher education, sophistication, elites, success, ambition, wealth, religion, on and on, have been unconsciously accepted as “facts.” Those beliefs’ predictable and attendant results include inferiority feelings, resentment, anger, powerlessness (denied through violence, common in many “powerless” societies and ghettos), et al. The beliefs are accepted from within and confirmed from without.

Bullying, intimidation and violence are manifestations of fear and WEAKNESS, not confidence and strength. Such people aren’t genuinely strong enough to get what they want through intelligence, skill or training. Escalating material and physical threats are what remain to them.

Unable to attract the best and brightest and the jobs and money accompanying them, because of the South’s belief systems, it’s cherished “traditional values,” scams like the Big River Steel plant almost HAVE to be accepted and welcomed, so hungry for jobs are those areas.

The corruption, hypocrisy and desperation inviting such measures compounds and reinforces generations of negative “belief systems” and “proves” how inferior the place and its people are, perpetuating beliefs in inferiority as “facts” (but blaming outsiders).

Absent the best educations, well-paying jobs and diverse cultural climates, no wonder fundamentalist religion is widely embraced. It gives a sense of moral superiority over other belief systems that generate better educations, brighter job opportunities, happier futures and more welcoming diverse cultures.

Religious “superiority” requires no thought. In fact it DEMANDS avoiding critical thinking—the kind of thinking higher education develops. Only obedience and surrender to Father Knows Best authorities promise eternal rewards (after you’re dead) through tithing and parroting conformist Biblical dogma (itself bloody and violent while pretending to embody “Love”). If you “fail” in life, it’s because you don’t have enough “faith.” Tithe MORE. Be MORE dogmatic. Everybody else is of Satan.

No wonder religionists fight so viciously to maintain “traditional values” in the face of natural evolution, change and progress, which are “believed” to be threats. Fundamentalism may be a superstitious myth but it’s all they’ve got, so they believe it with all their might. (See the Middle East or Africa.)

No wonder Arkansas and the South generally have so long maintained bottom-rung status: That’s where Southerners REALLY believe they belong.

Of course, they can’t admit it: too threatening on every level. Especially to the Powers That Be. Instead, lip-service is paid to seeming to strive for never-ending “revitalization” projects and promises of tourism influxes to visit mediocre bridges.

Yet Southerners will unconsciously reject every attempt to TRULY bring better education, better jobs, better social conditions, equality for women / blacks / gays / immigrants and non-“believers,” because “better” isn’t their Belief System.

“Bottom” is.

Yes, things are generally “better” throughout the South than in the 30s or 50s. But the South STILL clings to the bottom rungs relative to everywhere else.

Some, who successfully change their belief systems, stay and fight for growth and progress and enlightenment. Many more leave for greener pastures. Far easier than battling insistence on conforming to inferiority.

Like victims who believe deep-down they “love” their abusers, and if they "love" them enough they can change their oppressors, the majority will NEVER change their beliefs, no matter how ugly or doomed, because they don’t know they can, and don’t know how.

They believe they’re facts.
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 23:48:40 -0600 Arkansas Times
Jason Rapert refuses to accept the reality that President Obama was in attendance at a prayer breakfast because it interferes with his belief system. Why not be honest about it, as Norma asks above? Because it interferes with his belief system. Even Thurmond came around to renounce racism. It just makes me wonder what some people are hiding in their refusal to acknowledge reality. Rapert seems to be hiding from his own racism. Ed Koch hid from his homosexuality. The more strident someone is in his or her refusal to deal with objective truth the more I suspect they have some sort of Thurmond/Koch like secret.
Posted by Vanessa]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 21:56:39 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by radical centrist]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 21:46:10 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by couldn't be better]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 21:34:20 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 21:18:45 -0600 Arkansas Times http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2013/02/04…

This just makes me wonder what kind of secrets today's right wing nuts are keeping hidden. Too many people still think it's better to keep up appearances rather than deal with reality.
Posted by Vanessa]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:55:51 -0600 Arkansas Times
6 Nov

Will Bond ‏@1willbond
@johnbrummett Team Tyler continues to push out the vote. Your numbers are off. Can you say State Senator Linda Tyler?

Will Bond ‏@1willbond
@johnbrummett we think you will be rewriting your column late tonight. #sleepygrumpycolumnist.

And the rest is history.
Posted by radical centrist]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:51:14 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:47:16 -0600 Arkansas Times
Anyway, Norma, we need to judge a politician on his total record. I'm not passing judgment on that. That is the role of historians. I was not a big Ed Koch fan when I saw him on television, because I thought he was a self-promoting egotist, but that doesn't keep him from being a great politician.
Posted by plainjim]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:32:34 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by Mean Gene]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:17:55 -0600 Arkansas Times
The history is fascinating and revealing about people and society. The point is that Koch deliberately did so little to address AIDS, DESPITE BEING IN A POSITION TO DO IT: not merely that he was closeted.

Others addressed it. Others took action. Straights too. Margaret Thatcher. Bill Gates. C. Everett Koop. Elizabeth Taylor (starting in 1985). Diane Feinstein. Barney Frank NEVER fought recognition of the AIDS crisis, closeted or out. THAT'S the point. Not the closet.

That Koch shunned dealing with it BECAUSE he was a self-loathing gay man selfishly afraid of wrecking his future political chances by risking exposure of his supposed "secret"--and his resulting ugly treatment of his then-lover and other close friends--preferring to let the epidemic kill thousands rather than face it with political or personal integrity and courage--that he lied about himself and what he did all the way to the grave--says everything about the man.

The point is that there were politicians and public figures who did address AIDS--selflessly, at great potential risk to their careers, considering public opinion of the day.

THEY'RE the ones rightly admired to this day.

The whitewashing of Ed Koch for the past 30 years is contemptible, because it requires accomplices and enablers who help Koch get by with it.

Why not be honest about it, instead?

Because once you fully grasp the answer to that question, you'll see how monstrous he truly was.

Signorile is absolutely right.
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 20:13:14 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 19:46:21 -0600 Arkansas Times
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endsc…

seems it's normal for the breed, Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers
Posted by eLwood]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 19:10:06 -0600 Arkansas Times Posted by plainjim]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 19:02:42 -0600 Arkansas Times
"Koch led his city for 12 years, with a brash, humor-tinged style that came to personify the New York of the 1980s."

Mayor Bloomberg called Koch "our most tireless, fearless, and guileless civic crusader," and said Koch's "tough, determined leadership and responsible fiscal stewardship ... helped lift the city out of its darkest days and set it on course for an incredible comeback," adding, "When someone needed a good kick in the rear, he gave it to them."

Yeah, well.

Somebody else reminded me later today of the ugly facts about Ed Koch that everybody, including the NYT in its obituary (later modified because of the outrage), tries to ignore and hide.

The nonsense about not speaking ill of the dead would mean ignoring the Holocaust to focus solely on Hitler's giving the world the people's car: the Volkswagen.

Let's get real about Koch.

Ed Koch was gay. Not "rumored" to be gay. Gay. Everybody knew it, the way everybody knew Ken Mehlman is gay (even when he served his GOP minders by vehemently denying the truth and supporting anti-gay Republican legislation and bigotry). Mehlman has since reformed and is actively working for equality to make amends for his former closeted life.

Not Ed Koch.

"Koch's silence on AIDS in those critical first years spoke volumes," Michelangelo Signorile reminds us. "Koch's national ambitions had him running away from gays, fearful of what any association might reveal about himself."

"Needle exchange for injecting drug users was assiduously resisted by the Koch administration, leading to thousands of unnecessary HIV infections. Even Britain under conservative Maggie Thatcher embraced needle exchange early on and virtually contained that end of the epidemic."

"Three years into the epidemic, Koch's administration had shockingly only spent $24,500 on AIDS while, that same year, 'San Francisco, a city one-tenth the size of New York, spent $4.3 million, a figure that grew to over $10 million annually by 1987.'"

In case you didn't know the truth about Ed Koch, Signorile names names. And concludes:

"Ed Koch's closet turned him into a monster, harming and abusing those around him while turning his back on suffering and mass death."

Never forget.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michelangelo…
Posted by Norma Bates]]> Mon, 04 Feb 2013 17:56:48 -0600 Arkansas Times